The assessment by team physician Dr. Brian Cole on Tuesday means the point guard could return around mid-January to early February, or miss next season. The doctor added there is a chance Rose could be back sooner, but “we’re not going to rush it.”

The Bulls had already said Rose has a torn anterior cruciate ligament in his left knee. Cole said there were also two tears in his meniscus cartilage.

He said Rose is “doing great,” that the surgery went “extremely well” and he can still be an explosive player.

“It’s impossible to predict tomorrow,” Cole said during a news conference at Chicago’s Rush University Medical Center. “Statistically, he should be that player and then some. That doesn’t mean he’s guaranteed. It’s a whole lot better than we were accustomed to years ago. The ligament is one thing and the meniscus is another. Getting all the things to heal appropriately is really our goal in the early phases. Then, it’s rehab, conditioning _ getting his brain connected to his knee, basically.”

General manager Gar Forman insisted the Bulls won’t rush Rose, that they are more focused on the long term than the short-term hit they’ll take without him. The GM is “hopeful” and “optimistic” his franchise player will return next season but isn’t sure he will.

“In putting this team together, everything was looking at the big picture, long term,” Forman said. “I think it’s our job to stay focused on that and to continue to look at what we feel is a long window of opportunity to have success and that’s how we’ll approach it.”

Rose had surgery on Saturday after being injured two weeks earlier in Chicago’s playoff-opening win over Philadelphia, a major blow for a team eyeing its first championship since the Michael Jordan-Scottie Pippen era. The Bulls simply weren’t the same without their superstar point guard and bowed out in six games, making them the fifth top seed to lose to an eighth seed.

Chicago was closing out a 103-91 victory in Game 1 and Rose was showing his MVP form when everything changed.

He came to a jump stop in the lane with about 1:20 left and his leg buckled. He went up again and passed to Carlos Boozer in midair before crashing to the court, sending a chill through the arena.

That certainly wasn’t what the Bulls envisioned after capturing home-court advantage throughout the playoffs for the second straight season despite a long list of injuries. They were eyeing another big run after losing to Miami in the Eastern Conference finals last season, but with their leading scorer sidelined, they made an early exit, becoming the second No. 1 seed in two years to fall in the first round.

Rose averaged 21.8 points and 7.9 assists, but had trouble staying healthy after capturing the MVP a year ago. He missed 27 games because of groin, back, toe, foot and ankle problems that the team does not think led to the ACL tear.

“This could be anything from a completely random event _ which in a non-contact injury, most of the time that’s what it is _ to maybe conditioning,” Cole said. “We’ll never know with certainty. My feeling is it’s more likely than not a very random even that happened. If you watch the video, you can see … the forces are just right to tear the ligament.”